


An Altered Flow

by Agranulocytosis



Series: In Time's Flow [3]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: AU of an AU, F/M, Gen, Time Loop, Time Travel, Time Travel Fix-It, Two Byleths
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-07-04
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:15:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25059124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Agranulocytosis/pseuds/Agranulocytosis
Summary: Byleth has fought endlessly to try and change the course of fate amidst the inexorable rapids of time, never losing hope despite repeated failures. One mistake, however, leads to him being thrown into a situation where there is little hope of escape.Yet, from adversity blooms new potential. Perhaps this time, with Sothis at last by his side, he might be able to change Fódlan's destiny once and for all.---[Based upon another one of my fics, 'In Time's Flow', but can be generally treated as a variation of NG+]
Series: In Time's Flow [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1677646
Comments: 3
Kudos: 51





	An Altered Flow

**Author's Note:**

> Hit a looooong block with my main piece (In Time's Flow), that I somehow created another spin-off based upon the Byleth there, that may or may not be him at some point in that story. It's less confusing than it sounds, honest!  
> ...in all likelihood, I'll probably update this again before I finally get to working on properly developing the next chapter of that fic.
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

_Backwash: n. the motion of receding waves;  
n. the unpleasant after-effects of an event;  
v. clean (a filter) by reversing the flow of fluid through it._

* * *

Darkness.

It was a world utterly devoid of light and sound. As the dying embers of running adrenaline slowly ebbed away from Byleth’s lifeblood, a sinking sensation slowly set into his gut. He’d had Solon dead to rights, had already managed to delay his father’s death twice over by making Kronya doubt her affiliations and keeping the two Agarthans separate from each other when they launched their inevitable attack on the Chapel in the Monastery town.

Then, one costly mistake, one moment of hesitation, and the victory he’d been so close to achieving in this life spent masquerading as Alois’ squire while Jeralt led the Golden Deer had been wrenched away from his grasp.

What he had failed to expect, and that he’d completely neglected to take into account after the many lives he’d lived, were the repercussions that came with his recent innovations in this life. While he had never been caught by the Forbidden Spell of Zahras ever since his first life since he never gave the opportunity for Solon to take advantage of Kronya’s implanted Crest Stone, Solon had simply utilised another source of power for the spell that Byleth scarcely comprehended the magical matrices of. In past lives, they had never fully developed a functional use for Flayn's blood, that he'd forgotten the Agarthans' most recent innovations.

Now, once more, he was cast out of the flow of time – possibly _space,_ too – into a dimension of darkness where he had no hope of escaping.

And this time, unlike his first life, there was no Sothis.

No Divine Pulse, no powers of the Goddess, not even the Sword of the Creator – the Death Knight had taken that months ago. All he had in every life since his first was his Crest of Flames, and the knowledge and skills that had been accrued over the years.

He was just Byleth.

Since his escape from this same dimension he was now the sole denizen of, Sothis had gone silent, and her power over the course of time had likewise become erratic. Byleth had lived life after life, trapped within a timeless eternal curse, as he saw friends and comrades fall in battle across multiple battle lines. No intervention on his part had _ever_ been able to change the inevitability of events.

Choice assassinations, political manoeuvres, fighting on the sides of the Empire, Kingdom, and Alliance, learning under Indech’s tutelage, venturing off to Almyra, even abandoning the war in Fódlan altogether… he’d tried them all. Nothing had worked. The moment the war came, time would skip ahead five years, and by then the embers of war would always be fiercely raging. At the end, even if he triumphed over Nemesis in the swamp, in the Tailtean Pleans, at the gates of Garreg Mach, or a dozen other battlegrounds, he’d awaken once more in Remire Village.

How long had it been? Dozens of lives? Hundreds?

It didn’t matter. He had lost. The Agarthans had won.

In this dimension, perhaps he could finally find rest. It was a tempting idea. After all these years of repeated failure, it looked like this would finally be his last. He could leave all thoughts of war and Fódlan behind.

He would simply drift here timeless, ageless, never once dying. It was no different from the way his life had been for as long as he could remember.

Immediately, though, his thoughts snapped toward those who were still struggling in the world he had been cast away from just moments ago. This life… there had been so much _potential_ in this most recent life.

He had forced the Agarthans to reveal their hand, after Jeritza had been forced to give up his position within the Monastery to silence Lonato Gaspard. His blunder at assassinating Cornelia had led to their desperate move to kidnap Flayn with a different method than their norm, and use her blood to artificially retrieve her Crest for their own use. He had earned Seteth’s trust, and had forged relationships not only between himself and students of all three Houses, but also between each of the Houses.

He had learned of the true nature of Lysithea’s Crest incompatibility, and the combined intellect and expertise of Flayn, Linhardt, and herself had been so close to a breakthrough. He had witnessed how Dimitri had been slowly learning to deal with the aftermath of the Tragedy of Duscur. Ashe had been steeled into a fine soon-to-be Bow Knight. At the Battle of the Eagle and Lion, and later the defense of Remire Village, each of the Houses had demonstrated their capability, wit, and determination in far greater amounts than his early lives.

So many new discoveries. A united Fódlan that triumphed over the remnants of the Agarthan civilisation without any of his beloved friends, students, and comrades losing their lives was so close to becoming a reality.

All rendered pointless because of a single miscalculation.

He cursed bitterly, his words lost in an empty dimension. He would have raged, striking out into the darkness, but here in this world, there was no concept of space.

_Is this how it all ends?_

It couldn’t be. All those lives… all the deaths he had seen… was _this_ all that they amounted to?

He refused to believe that. His friends didn’t deserve that sort of end. Even Rhea and Edelgard, who both had at times had behaved erratically – one paranoid over the nature of humans, the other hateful of the Church’s absolute control over Fódlan – had been compassionate and doing what they truly believed was best for Fódlan. Their steely determination was what had led them to take the actions he had witnessed many times over in his countless lives.

What could he do, without Sothis’ power?

Though he had initially cursed the Goddess he had never asked to dwell within him through his implanted heart in his early lives for his fate, now, more than ever, he wished she would reappear. Despite forgetting the finer details of the events of his first life, he remembered how she always had the answers whenever he had been caught out in a tight spot. It had been her who had reversed the flow of time when the bandit leader Kostas’ axe had been about to end his life, and it had been her who had cast him out of this dark dimension, even if doing so had led to him being trapped in this endless time loop.

“Sothis…” he whispered into the darkness, audible through the absolute silence. “Where are you?”

Silence.

He hadn’t expected anything less. There was no forthcoming miracle.

Byleth was alone.

-o-o-o-

How long had it been? Did time even hold any meaning here?

With nothing else to occupy his thoughts, he had been brooding over the many ‘what-ifs’ he hadn’t ever had the opportunity to test out yet. In his most recent life, he had learned so much. The Abyss _actually_ existed, along with the fourth unofficial house, the Ashen Wolves, even though he had never actually met any of them in person. Somewhere in their number was one who possessed the Crest of Timotheos, that had been usurped by the Agarthans to create enraged and empowered Demonic Beasts through the events he had somehow set into motion through his intervention.

They hadn’t played a role in hundred of lives. What had changed?

There were three key points of divergence. Jeritza’s flight from the Monastery, Cornelia’s escape from Faerghus, and the tighter bonds created between members of the three Houses. In one way or another, everything that had been different about that life had arisen because of those three changes.

Which of those three had been responsible for the Abyss’ involvement? Were they, like Lonato, misled by the Agarthans? Were they even aware of their contribution, or had the Agarthans somehow duped them or otherwise procured the Crest of Timotheus? _Where,_ even, was the Abyss, and how could the Agarthans possibly have come into contact with them?

What could he have done differently? What would have happened, had he not been so Ailell-damned stupid as to overlook the fact that Solon could cast his Forbidden Spell through the power that they had extracted from Flayn?

Questions. Pointless questions.

They were all that Byleth could ask.

With nothing else to occupy his time, he continued to think.

-o-o-o-

Despite an eternity of thinking, he found no definitive conclusion as to what he should have done differently. No matter what course of action he took, his intervention on one front meant that he would be absent on another, which would in turn create further ripples in the river of time. There was no solid path that was set in stone for him, save the sight of Fódlan’s inevitable fall to Agartha time and time again.

How had Rhea’s song from the bygone days of the Nabateans at Zanado gone again? ‘ _Flames ever burning bright’,_ and _‘broken memories alight’_?

Certainly apt, considering his confusing status as a human who possessed part of the Goddess’ power.

Time passed.

Then –

_“You idiot! How long are you going to keep moping here?!”_

He stilled. He didn’t know how long he had been alone for, but it wasn’t so much the fact that someone else was present here, but rather _who_ had spoken.

That voice –

“ _Sothis?”_ he gasped. There was only emptiness around him, but his not-body that had scarcely moved for Goddess-knows-how-long flinched, looking around wildly. Had he gone mad, now? It had been eons since he had last heard her, but –

“You idiot!” she repeated, and abruptly, a ghostly figure of herself materialised in front of him, and despite his hardened years of combat through countless lives, he was fully taken aback. An instant later, her form turned corporeal, into the familiar figure of the Goddess neither of them had fully understood the nature of in his first life.

_Sothis._

It was Sothis, in the flesh.

And though the name registered with him, the word continued to resound and echo in his mind, growing deafeningly loud.

Sothis. This was _Sothis._

“Sothis…” he repeated, staring wide-eyed at her.

“Wow!” she sarcastically intoned, irate, meeting his stare with one of annoyance. “Congratulations! After all these years, you know my name! An amazing feat!”

She looked different, for lack of a better term. Slightly taller than he’d last seen her, looking a little like a cross between the Sothis that he had known and Rhea. And despite her words, she sounded less childish, but there was still that characteristic mischief and slight frustration he had associated with the Goddess that dwelled within him.

Still shorter than him, though.

There were many things he wanted to tell her. He had been thankful to her for the second chances she gave him early on. Then, he had honestly begun to hate her, after a few dozen lives had passed. That had mellowed out into indifference shortly after.

He was grateful for her. He cared for her. He hated her. She had been dead for possibly hundreds of lives. He’d lived so many lifetimes without her presence, that seeing and hearing her now was startling.

Struck with so many confused emotions at once, along with the questions that he had been bottling up since time immemorial, he found himself at a lost for words as conflicting thoughts entwined within.

Why had she kept sending him back? Why had she not spoken to him before? What, even, was the nature of the Divine Pulse? Why was she here _now?_

She, however, took the initiative to speak first.

“Hundreds of years!” She paced in front of him, her feet somehow stepping on ground that wasn’t there in the emptiness of the Dimension of Zahras. “You fool! _Hundreds of years,_ and you still refuse to accept that not everyone gets to have a happy ending! You… you absolute moron!”

He gaped at her, the sight somehow extremely familiar, having been subjected to that sort of tirade from the Goddess in his first life, and yet entirely foreign and overwhelmingly bizarre.

“Hello, Byleth,” she said again, a bittersweet solemnness carved into her words. “It’s been awhile, hasn’t it?”

Yet another subtle difference from how he’d remembered Sothis being, even if his memory of her wasn’t the clearest. She tended to refer to him as ‘fool’, ‘idiot’, or ‘moron’, rather than calling him by name.

“Sothis…” Again, words failed him. “How… why… _what?!”_

“Try again,” she shot back. “Surely even a fool like you can dignify yourself with proper speech?”

He openly gaped at her. Seconds passed.

“How are you here? Are you even real? And why…” His voice cracked slightly, as confused emotions continued directed at a person long-dead and long-lost distorted his thoughts. Bitterness entered his voice. “Why did you keep sending me _back?”_

“Haven’t you figured it out yet?” she said, her tone matching his own, mixed with a gentle sadness. “I told you long ago, Byleth. Your will and mine are now as one. Both sides of time are revealed to you… and you alone.”

She drifted toward him slowly, a palm outstretched. Entranced, he reached out, and was startled to find a familiar warmth as they made contact, in stark contrast to the cold of Zahras.

She was real _._

This – this was all _real._

Softly, she continued speaking as Byleth was still struggling to process that fact. “I said it before, didn’t I? Our souls have joined, Byleth. You and I will never – have never – been apart.”

An old memory. A throne resting within a plane of darkness.

He remembered those words. She had relinquished her power to him. She claimed that she had ceased to exist. But if Sothis had really been with him all this time…

“Then why –“ It took all that he had in him to force the words out. “Why the time loop? Why send me back?” Frustration grew, and emotions that had been bottled up inside of him for years trapped in time’s unceasing flow were released as a flood. “You said that this power was mine, but… but _I never asked for any of this!_ All the deaths… everyone I’ve known _…_ all this damned bloodshed… I hated it all! Why did you never let me _die_?!”

It had been some time since he’d lost control of his emotions. The last time had been back when his mistake had almost cost Flayn her life at Zanado. For brief seconds, all he could hear was the sound of his own breathing, as he stared at the Goddess who had been the first person he had truly called his friend, one that had been silent for centuries.

“Don’t you get it, Byleth?” She floated closer, her palm against his cheek, an almost motherly touch. He stiffened at the contact, drawing away momentarily, but Sothis followed through. “I didn’t lie. All this time… this power has been yours.”

It took an instant for the meaning of her words to sink in.

“That can’t be true,” he retorted immediately. “I couldn’t use the Divine Pulse since the time that we merged. And you’re saying – you’re saying _I_ did all this?”

It was impossible. He didn’t want to be trapped in this endless loop. He’d never wanted that. He had spent lives away from Fódlan, only to be brought back to the very start. Even when he tried killing himself, he always found himself whisked back to Remire Village. This couldn’t have been his doing.

“Impossible,” he whispered. “It can’t be right. This – all this – it has to be you.”

She shook her head sadly. “Are you sure, Byleth?” she questioned. “Can you honestly say that you would have seen your precious students die if it meant you could continue to live on? Would you not give up your life for Seteth or Flayn, or even Rhea? Would you have been willing to see Edelgard killed, even if it meant the end of war?”

“Her death doesn’t change anything,” he countered automatically. That was something he’d tried _extremely_ early on. “Hubert, Randolph, and other dissenters in the Empire take her place and use her as a martyr against the Church. There’s too much silent anger toward Rhea and the Central Church. If anything, it only hastened the arrival of war.”

“I know. That only proves my point, doesn’t it?” she said, a faint smile on her lips. “Didn’t I tell you? I’ve been with you from the very start. You fool… you would have done – no, you _have_ done everything you could to stop that from happening.”

_All this time…_

Had this endless curse really have been of his doing? It was hard to believe, but…

Come to think of it, hadn’t Sothis chastised him in this dimension as a boulder that rolled down whichever hill it landed on? Had he been doing that for this entire time?

He wasn’t sure whether or not to believe it, but a second nagging thought gnawed at him. “Even so… how are you here _now?”_

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “It’s strange… for so long, it felt like I was watching through your eyes, my spirit a part of your body. My thoughts were separate from yours, but our souls are intertwined. Then, when Solon caught you in his trap… something _changed_. It took me some time, but here I am.”

“Perhaps a property of this dimension,” he mused, as though this was no different from working his way through a magical problem with Lysithea. “If, as you said before, that this world is separate from the realm we came from… time and space may be different from what we know. Langston’s Second Principle does suggest that spatial magics act on both soul and spirit to transpose them between places via a timeless intermediary vector. We know he needed a Crest Stone to cast the spell, and if the powers of the Nabateans are derived from yours, then if we extend that –”

“Blah blah, magical theory talk. You wouldn’t believe how annoying it was listening to you babble on about all that from inside you,” she scoffed. “The point of the matter is this: For now, our souls are disentangled. You never did fall into his trap after our first life. I suppose that even a fool like you learned a thing or two… even if it’s only because of your latest mistake that we finally meet again.”

Heh. He supposed that in some ways, Sothis really hadn’t changed much.

“I admit, some of the blame might have been mine,” she said uneasily, and for the first time, the Goddess actually looked slightly ashamed. “We never fully discovered who we both were at this point in our first life, but we’ve learnt so much since then. After knowing the truth of who I am… I know now that the Divine Pulse and the powers of the progenitor God were never meant to be fully wielded by mortal hands. You never had full control of it after our merger, even after all these years, even if you possessed the Sword made out of my bones, and my own heart within you. All you could do was send yourself back to where it all began time and time again.”

She hesitated for a moment. Byleth was still processing this new bit of information. In some ways… it made sense. Even at his lowest, when he’d been near catatonic in Remire Village after that life where he’d trained till his body and spirit had almost been broken but still failed in defending Garreg Mach against the combined Agarthan and Empire forces, he had eventually thrown himself back into that endless cycle.

“For what it’s worth, Byleth,” she said slowly, her eyes not meeting his. “I’m sorry.”

Sothis would never have said those words in his first life, if his vague memories of her were correct… but it seemed that he hadn’t been the only one to have changed after all these years. She’d been a silent observer, helpless to act, save for her power to be called upon when he blundered away with the Divine Pulse unknowingly at the end of each life. She could only watch the events unfold, and that thought froze away all simmering embers of resentment he might have held toward her.

Like all his other dear students and friends, Sothis was no different. In the end, all of this had been _his_ fault, and now she was stuck here with him.

And surprising himself, he reached out, bringing the friend he had not seen for lifetimes into a hug. She stiffened, but unlike squirming as she would have done before, she accepted it, her own hands wrapping tightly around him. They stayed there for several seconds, before he broke away.

“I’m sorry too, Sothis,” he said softly. “Because of me… you’ve been forced to relive this over and over. You’ve just been stuck inside this whole time while I screwed up time and time again, haven’t you? How long has it been?”

She looked taken aback by his own apology. Her reply came only a second later. “Eight hundred and fifty-three lives… even if I couldn’t talk to you… I’ve seen you through it all, Byleth.”

_853 lives._

He knew that there should have been a proper response to her words. Perhaps apologise again for making her relive events time and time again while he wielded a power he didn’t know how to use, or express his frustration at how despite all that time, there hadn’t been anything that worked.

Instead, he spoke the very first thought that entered his mind.

“Huh. I was expecting only the low two-hundreds.”

If he was really being honest, that was surprising. Come to think of it, now that she’d given him a definite number, did that officially make him older in absolute years than Rhea yet? Did the five-year period that he lost in each life during the time gap count?

That caught Sothis off-guard, but an instant later, she scowled, rapping him hard on the head with her fist. “Now is not the time to joke, you idiot!” she chastised. “I’m being serious!”

Sothis, serious? That would have been something he wouldn’t have ever expected back in his first life, save for when he screwed up tremendously and was forced to rely on her power.

“We both screwed up hard, didn’t we?” He chuckled to himself. “Rhea couldn’t have found a bigger idiot to give your heart to.”

“We’re both fools, then,” she agreed unexpectedly. “Eight hundred lives, and only _now_ we meet once more.”

To think that if he’d been _more_ stupid, and let himself be caught in Solon’s spell all that time back, he could have learned what he now knew. And now, the first time he was stupid enough to do that, he didn’t have the Sword of the Creator with him.

No more words needed to be said between them. Their souls had been attached since the time her Crest Stone had been implanted into him. More than any other, they knew the feelings that each of them held.

Regret. Shame. Possibly anger, although that was rapidly fading.

But beneath all that… determination. They wouldn’t have changed a single thing. Even if he regretted failing to see the truth of the loop all this time, and still couldn’t see the full picture of things despite hundreds of years of experience, he wouldn’t have done anything differently. He knew Sothis felt the same way.

They apologised to each other, and that was enough. In this same place, Sothis had once said that apologising wouldn’t make things right.

They needed to do _more_.

They were a team, and though they hadn’t communicated for well over a thousand years, Byleth felt perfectly in sync with her.

“What now?” he asked, eyes focussed. Alone, he couldn’t do anything, especially without the Sword. But with Sothis here... perhaps together, they may have a chance. “Can we get out?”

“Do you realise what sort of situation we’re in?”

“Yeah,” he said, nodding sombrely. “Without the Sword, and with our souls now merged… we can’t get out of here the way we did all that time before, can we?”

 _It would take the powers of a god to leave this place,_ she had once said. Both her bones within the Sword of the Creator and her heart that gifted him his Crest of Flames had been necessary. With the Sword, he had ripped their way out of the Spell of Zahras, returning to face Solon in battle.

Without it, they would be trapped here for all eternity until their hearts and minds eroded away.

There was a second’s pause before she responded. “Not the same way, no…” she said, trailing off. “But now that I know more about who I am, there is a chance that we can still get ourselves out of here. If you're dead set on trying to rescue everyone, even though you know nothing has worked... there is one last chance to make things right.”

“A chance?” he followed up automatically, eyes snapping to hers. There was doubt, but also determination. “What do you mean?”

“This place exists outside of time,” she said, gesturing around herself. “And with our souls now bonded less tightly than before, I may be able to use what remains of myself within you to send us back.”

“I’m sensing a ‘but’ in there,” he said, noticing her odd tone. “What is it?”

“ _Space_ is separate here,” she explained slowly. “In our first life, when you used my power for the first time after our souls merged… you didn’t _reverse_ time the way the Divine Pulse did. You ripped a hole open across dimensions using the power of the progenitor God.”

He vaguely remembered that. The Sword had glowed a bright red, and he remembered the look of absolute shock on Solon’s face when he emerged from a portal wielding the Sword of the Creator, with the colour of his hair changed to the characteristic green of the Nabateans. They didn’t have the Sword now, but her heart still dwelled within him.

“It will likely take up all the power of my Crest Stone,” she said. “But because this place operates on a different concept of time and space, my powers will interact with it in a different way. We won’t reverse time, or return to exactly where we were before, and you will likely lose your Crest of Flames… but we _can_ leave this dimension.”

Even then, there was still some nuance left unsaid. In response to his quizzical stare at her odd tone, she continued speaking. “Before, when you used our combined powers, I could feel you drawing on my power to return exactly to the realm you left behind. But –“ She held up a finger, wagging it in the air. “That only used up _more_ of my power. If, instead, we leave precision behind to accommodate for the lack of my bones in the Sword of the Creator…”

She looked at him knowingly, and he filled in the blanks. Her idea… if it worked, it had merit to it.

“You think that we can force ourselves out of here into a random point in the past.” His brows scrunched up in thought. “But isn’t that risky? How do time and dimensions even work, anyway? If Archibald’s Third Postulate is correct, isn’t there a chance that we might be sent to a timeline where we’re already on the way to failure?”

“Your continued testing of my patience by referring to magical theory aside, there is,” she agreed. “And not just the past, but also the future _._ But look around you, Byleth.” Again, she gestured into the darkness for emphasis. “Do you really want to stay here while _they_ squabble among themselves and let Fódlan fall into ruin?”

The answer came immediately.

“No.”

“Then we don’t have any other choice,” she followed on easily. “And if I’m correct – and I’m _probably_ correct, anyway – because of the way that time and space interact, we might even be brought to a timeline that isn’t actually yours.”

That confused him. “What?”

“We know that the flow of time changes,” she said. “We’ve both seen that first-hand. The thing is this, Byleth: we’ve only been following your own river of time.”

The smug look on her face was extremely familiar, and something he was surprised to say he missed seeing. “Would you care to explain, oh Great and Powerful Goddess?”

“What if there were timelines where you weren’t, well – you? What if you woke up two seconds later at Remire Village, or ate something different for dinner the night before?” she fired off the questions rapidly. “Because you couldn’t control my power, you used what was most natural for yourself as a reference point. If I’m right, it’s also why you always lose five years because _that_ happened in your first life.”

_So even that was my fault. Goddess above, I’m an idiot._

“Was there even a single thing I did _right_?” he dryly commented, while his thoughts circled around what she said. If he was being honest, he wasn’t sure that he fully understood, but going on the meaning alone… “So, what? We end up in a world where I’m not _me_?”

“No,” she replied, a teasing tug on her lips. “We end up in a world where you’re _not_ you.”

A second passed.

“What.” His flat and unimpressed tone betrayed his combined confusion and annoyance. “Sothis, I know you haven’t talked to anyone for hundreds of years, but could you please _explain_ what you mean? Isn’t that exactly what I said?”

“We are travelling across dimensions _,_ Byleth,” she said mysteriously. “ _Dimensions_ , rather than time.”

How did that even change anything? He was about to snap at her to speak her words directly, but then abruptly stilled as the semantics she was hinting at hit him.

“I’m not me,” he echoed. His widened eyes found her own playful ones. “You’re saying that I won’t be _that_ Byleth.”

“Perhaps there’s a Byleth, perhaps there isn’t,” she said, nodding. “He might be you, or he might be very different from you. Ultimately, if there _is_ one, there will be two little Byleths running around Fódlan.”

He’d never run into that situation before, because he’d been using his own flow of time as a reference for his unwieldy use of Sothis’ power. In this dimension, where space and time were separate from Fódlan’s own, what she was speaking of just might hold a shred of potential.

Still, he didn’t want to be excited over nothing. Eight hundred and fifty-three lifetimes had led to him developing a healthy level of scepticism, even if some people might call him overly paranoid.

“Are you sure you can do this?”

“Who’s the Goddess between the two of us, you or me?” she shot back. “I might have miscalculated before in our first life, but I’ve had plenty of time to feel what you’ve felt each time you sent yourself back. It will take all the power left in our heart, but it _can_ be done. I know it.”

A world where he wouldn’t be the Byleth that originally existed there. That sounded absolutely insane. But if what Sothis was correct, then that had immense potential.

If this new world didn’t have the equivalent of himself, then he just had to intervene in the way he always did before, only now the outcome would be fully set in stone, since Sothis would have to tap fully on the power resting within the Crest Stone. He couldn’t afford failure there.

And if there _was_ another Byleth running around… that would make things interesting. Assuming that that Byleth would take a similar course of action as his early lives had, he could take charge of one of the factions at the Monastery, while Byleth himself worked in the shadows using what knowledge he had of the future. The problem he had always encountered was that intervening in one area meant a lack of influence on his part in another. If there was a second Byleth around, he could concentrate fully on manoeuvring things behind the scene.

Better yet, if he returned in the way that his body currently was, since he wasn’t traveling through time, he would be in peak condition to hit the ground running rather than having to spend time training himself up again. In this life, he had worked on both martial skill and magic, which would give him decent versatility in influencing events.

There were many untapped allies to try to draw on. Kronya had been one such candidate in the past, but turning her had come at the cost of neglecting to fully focus on his students. He’d recently tried with Lonato, but that too had failed, although it had forced Jeritza out of hiding in order to silence him after he voluntarily surrendered at Magdred Way.

It was risky, though. The outcome would be definite. If he made a single misstep as he had in this current life, he would no longer be able to be sent back into the past. There were many uncertainties, his recent discovery of the existence of Abyss among them.

What Fódlan needed above all else was a common enemy. Edelgard’s vision of reshaping Fódlan by overthrowing the Church’s authority was too drastic a change for the land. It had to be a gradual course of events, one that looked promising in this life, with the Agarthans being forced to reveal their hand.

How could he do the same again? Had it been his role as a squire that somehow done that? Or had it been his botched assassination of Cornelia, that ultimately allowed her to escape? Had it been Jeritza that discovered the underground city after being sent prematurely fleeing from the Monastery?

He didn’t know. As always, the rivers of time were absolutely turbid.

Still, regardless of outcome, it beat sitting around in this dimension doing nothing.

“You’ve decided, then.” Sothis nodded approvingly. “Good.”

There was a silent determination to her, now. She looked more mature, perhaps a little closer to the Goddess who had healed Fódlan after the devastation that had been left following the first conflict between the ancient Agarthan civilisation and the Nabateans. Whether it was because she had gradually uncovered more of herself through Byleth’s discoveries over the years, or because of the many experiences she had no doubt been subject to while dwelling within him, he had no clue.

There was just one last thing that nagged at him.

“What happens to you?” he asked, concerned. “The last time we merged, you disappeared forever. Will this be the same here?”

“I know more about my power, now. Our souls will merge, but not as tightly as before,” she said. “We will both escape from this dark place sharing one body, and although we will never again be able to use the Crest of Flames or the Divine Pulse, I will still be conscious dwelling within you. We can communicate, as we did in our first life.”

That relieved him. He didn’t want to be separated from her again, after spending eternity apart.

“What do we need to do?”

“I will take charge of it this time,” she said firmly, a palm outstretched, a mischievous smile on her face. “No offense, but I’ve learnt from my mistake the last time we were here. I do not intend to be a silent spectator as you fumble your way around hosting _tea parties_ with all of Fódlan again.”

“It was just that one life,” he protested. In response to her firm glare, he corrected himself. “Fine, maaaaybe two or three.”

“It was six,” she said, unimpressed. “And Byleth, meeting Edelgard every day for tea will _not_ make her reconsider rebelling against the Church.”

“Oh yeah, that had happened.” He chuckled. “I almost forgot.”

Having someone around who shared in all the experiences he had been singularly witnessed to was good. Perhaps she could see things he might have overlooked; offer him counsel in ways no one had managed to before.

“Honestly,” she snorted. “Eight hundred lives, and you’re still such an idiot.”

He shrugged. “You’re still short.”

“I’ve grown taller!” He laughed at her indignant tone as her body floated upward to match his height. “You – stop laughing!”

He missed this little back-and-forth they had always exchanged. It had been an eternity since they last met, but it was as though they had been attached at the hip forever.

_Well… that’s not exactly inaccurate._

“Are you ready?” she asked seriously, once their little moment of fun subsided. Steely determination was all that remained. “This will be our final go.”

He nodded. “Sothis?”

“Hmmm?” She glanced at him distractedly, concentrating on whatever needed to be done.

“It’s good to see you again. Really.”

“I know.” Her body glowed with brilliant golden light, turning into motes of power, as he felt a strange sensation tug at him from where his heart lay. “Eight hundred fifty fourth time’s the charm, right?”

And with that, she drifted toward him. Their hands met as they had in this place in his original life, Sothis taking the reins over her own power this time. He felt an odd sensation course through him, a blend he recognised as though crossing between the magics of _Warp_ and the tugging sensation he felt each time he unknowingly used his bastardised version of the Divine Pulse.

Moments later, in a world where time was meaningless, darkness was all that remained once again.

-o-o-o-

He found himself materialising in the vicinity of the Chapel near Garreg Mach, where Jeralt had been killed by Kronya the first time, and where he had most recently fallen prey to Solon’s spell. Thankfully, there didn’t seem to be anyone around. Wouldn’t be good for his first foray into what was likely to be a new world to be witnessed by some unfortunate bystander.

There were dozens of things he needed to know. Exactly _when_ Sothis had sent them, what might have diverged in this timeline that supposedly wasn’t his own, and what the most urgent matters he had to deal with were. For all he knew, the Byleth of this world – if one existed – could just be waking up in Remire Village, as he had over countless lifetimes, or he could be sent flying down from a collapsing cliff after the fall of Garreg Mach.

Before that, there was one pressing matter he absolutely had to confirm.

_‘Sothis?’_

‘ _I’m here,’_ the response came immediately. That sent waves of relief through him. She was understandably tired from the feat she performed, one he probably couldn’t comprehend, but she was _here._ ‘ _I can’t materialise so you can see me just yet. Hmm… this place… the Chapel, yes?’_

He nodded on pure reflex, unused to mentally conversing with her once again. He glanced around, taking in what he could. Trees, flowers in full bloom, and in the waning light of the evening sun, he could vaguely see the Monastery itself up in the path leading away from the town.

‘ _Seems like spring_ ,’ he mentally conversed. ‘ _Harpspring Moon, maybe?’_

‘ _Maybe. Look around a bit more.’_

Hopefully, she got the year right. If Sothis had sent them too far back, or not far enough, he wouldn’t know what he would need to do to set things right. Hell, even if he _were_ in the Imperial Year 1180, he still wasn’t fully certain yet of what he needed to attend to immediately.

He wandered out of the narrow alleyway he’d been lured into by Solon and the Agarthan forces, entering the town proper. A familiar sight greeted him, as activity in the town gradually died down at the close of the day. He thought he vaguely recognised some people, although he didn’t tend to roam the town much in recent lives, instead dedicating all he had to innovating new ways that might foil the Agarthans and the war.

Perhaps in this life, he could afford to spend some time interacting with them? He needed information, and time didn’t mean –

He cursed mentally. Time wasn’t meaningless anymore. He would need to get used to that. He was no longer empowered by the Crest Stone, but Sothis was still around. He felt an unfamiliar hole where the power of the Crest of Flames normally sat, and yet his heart still didn’t beat. It was strange, and raised yet more questions, but he didn’t have to deal with them urgently.

‘ _What’s wrong?’_

 _‘Nothing,’_ he answered automatically. _‘Let’s investigate more.’_

To be safe, he pulled up the hood of the travelling cloak he had thankfully worn, obscuring his distinctive blue hair from view. If a second Byleth was running around, he didn’t want to raise questions he couldn’t answer.

He walked through familiar streets. Spring was in full bloom, now. Even if he roughly knew the Moon they were in, short of asking around or finding a bulletin, it would be hard to know the year. Even though everything looked virtually unchanged around him, there was a chance that Sothis could have sent them back to before something as major as the Brigid and Dagda War, or the Tragedy of Duscur.

Then, he stepped through a crossing into the town square, and an eerily bizarre sight met his eyes. It so thoroughly threw him off, that he simply stood there, staring uncomprehendingly at the pair of people quietly sitting at one of the outdoor tables of the inn as they shared a meal.

‘ _Well.’_ Sothis sounded just as dumbfounded as him, lost for words. ‘ _Didn’t expect that.’_

Well, at least he knew the year was likely to be 1180, now. And from the looks of it, things hadn’t changed all that much from what he was used to.

For seated there was a man that he recognised as Jeralt the Blade Breaker, legendary mercenary and likely now Knight-Captain once more. Beside him was someone who greatly resembled him. This world had a Byleth, it seemed.

The only problem there was that _she_ was a girl.

‘ _Huh, who would have thought?’_ Sothis giggled. ‘ _You look pretty as a girl.’_

That snapped him into focus. Her comment didn’t deserve even a witty retort.

Dozens of conflicting thoughts struck at him, some mundane and trivial, others with nuances that could affect his future plans. If this was Harpspring Moon of 1180, then his students would be off on their first missions. If Jeralt and this Byleth were here, it meant that they must have already intervened against the bandits hired by Edelgard for her attempted assassination of the House Leaders, herself included among them. Since Jeralt was wearing his Knight-Captain’s uniform, he would assume that this Byleth was taking a position as instructor for one of the Houses, just as he had done many times over.

There were practical matters to deal with. Which House was this Byleth in charge of? Had anything even changed, save for the fact that he had been replaced with a female Byleth? What were the most urgent matters he needed to deal with? How much had the loss of the power of the Crest of Flames affected his effectiveness in combat?

And then there were more personal ones. As much as it pained him, Jeralt was no longer Byleth’s father. Thrown out of time, Byleth was a stranger to this world. His Jeralt – one he had grown close to in ways he hadn’t ever tried before, knowing that his relationships were wiped clean at the end of each life – was gone. So were Seteth, Flayn, Rhea, Alois and all the Knights of Seiros, and all of his students.

He was a stranger to this world, but he would protect Fódlan and his friends all the same.

As for the trivial, well: Was this Byleth even called _Byleth_? It was bizarre referring to someone who was not him, and yet him, except she was a her, with his own name, and wasn’t that a complex thought?

For simplicity’s sake, he’d just call her Bylass, for now. If she were part of the Golden Deer, no doubt Claude would already be terming her that just to get on her nerves. Perhaps this was part of Claude's influence rubbing off on him.

‘ _Does she also possess your power?’_ he raised the question. _‘Is there another Sothis running around?’_

 _‘Likely. Her hair colour hasn’t yet changed, but things couldn’t be that different, with how similar you two look.’_ She paused, before adopting a teasing quality to her voice. ‘ _You know, you could just go up to her and ask to feel her pulse.’_

‘ _Let’s not,’_ he shot the idea down flatly.

Instead, he took in the subtle details of her form. She was clearly no stranger to combat, and there were signs of musculature that came from wielding a sword in the way that Jeralt had once taught him during his life as a mercenary. She was probably working through her Beginner Classes – a Myrmidon, most likely. He’d done the same in his first life, even if he couldn’t remember at all whether he had shared dinner with his father at this particular inn.

It was at that moment that Jeralt glanced over to him, practised eyes hardened through years of mercenary work and as a Knight of Seiros scanning for threats at all times. Their eyes met, and Byleth felt a cold sensation grip at him –

– before Jeralt dismissed him entirely, returning his focus to his daughter, who was still mostly silent as she ate her meal, showing little emotion, much like how Byleth had once been.

In a way, that lack of recognition hurt him, even if it made his current position so much better.

‘ _Byleth?’_

‘ _It’s fine.’_ He waved Sothis’ concern aside. ‘ _Let’s get moving. Maybe we’ll see some other students around.’_

Lonato’s rebellion, influenced by the Agarthans. The theft of the Sword of the Creator during the Goddess’ Rite of Rebirth. Flayn’s kidnapping for the use of her blood. Abyss’ role, and the exact course of actions that had led to their involvement for the first time in his previous life. Cornelia, Jeritza, and all the Agarthans. Edelgard’s plans and current position of her goals.

All were things he needed to ascertain the current status of, and adjust his plans as necessary. There were options – scout on the Agarthans, uncover their secrets? Find a way into Abyss, and discern how they had come into the picture previously? Attempt to convince Lonato of the truth behind the Tragedy of Duscur? All sounded like good starting points, even before considering the more personal matters of his students where he might have to lend a slight nudge. For starters, he would need to point Lysithea toward the right direction in dealing with the issue of her Crests as soon as possible.

Byleth – ahem, _Bylass –_ could deal with maintaining the state of things in Garreg Mach, and hopefully that end of things wouldn’t be too different from how his first life had been. He would operate as another faction, separate from the Church, the Agarthans, or each of the three major powers of Fódlan. It wasn’t something he hadn’t done before.

 _Two Byleths._ This was not his world, but these were the same people he would gladly give up his last remaining life for if it meant they would be kept safe. The stakes were high, but the possibility of success were likewise raised. He had been so close before. This time, he would get it right for their sakes.

And now, for the first time in eight hundred and fifty-three lifetimes, he was not alone.

_‘We can do this, Sothis.’_

_‘Was there ever a doubt?’_

He grinned. Just like old times.

Looking away from the father-daughter duo, he thrust himself right back into his timeless endeavour of altering the course of fate.

There was work to be done.


End file.
